What was behind the “best-kept secret” in history? Part 1
Why the secret of Eleusis never got betrayed.
Mosaic depicting the Epiphany of Dionysus (second century AD), found in Dion, Greece, Archeological Museum of Dion.
Our greatest blessings come to us by way of mania, provided it is given us by divine gift.
-Plato (Phaedrus 244: c)
Eleusis is a shrine common to the whole earth and of ail the divine that exist among men, it is both the most terrible and the most luminous.’[1]
- Aristides (transl. by Walter Otto)
In another installment of this series about the Eleusinian Mysteries, which were taking place for nearly 2000 years just outside of Athens, this article will explore what was so special about the initiation at Eleusis and why the secret seems to have never been betrayed.
(Check out the earlier articles: 1 2 3 4 5
If you have Medium membership you can also read this article here.)
If we consider the scope and fame of this event at the time, with participants coming from all over the Mediterranean, some questions arise:
What was the secret of Eleusis?
How did they maintain this mystery for so long?
Or could the mystery even be betrayed?
First, I discuss the general purpose and nature of initiation before going into the nature of the initiatory experience in Eleusis. We have many reports of the ineffable nature of this experience which seem to indicate that none of the ritual components by themselves could be taken to constitute the actual secret.
We’ll look at some instances that became famous as the “profanation of the Mysteries” and caused a great scandal in Athens because some major political figures, including Alcibiades, one of Socrates’ students, were involved.
The inevitable discussion about the Kykeon, the ritual drink, consumed before the climax of the ceremony on the last night, will follow.
Mysteries and the Mystery
Mystery religions (sometimes also referred to as mystery cults) played a huge role in antiquity and were very widespread. They could be found in Greece as well as the Greek colonies, Persia, Egypt, Rome, and generally all around the Mediterranean from very early on. This should be no surprise as in many parts of the world ritual initiations were, and often still are, quite common.
These Mysteries themselves took many forms and shapes, spanning from the Roman Mithraic cult, with its fixed ritual structure and limitation to male soldiers, to the wild Dionysian Mysteries, also called Bacchanalia, which were different in every place, open to anyone and always moving around, to the Egyptian celebration of the Rites of Isis and Osiris, and the Anatolian Mysteries of the Great Mother.
These are just a few mentions, but there were countless local celebrations with individual themes, gods, and goddesses. In all their difference they shared some common elements, probably the most central one being the element of initiation.
Walter Burkert, a great classicists of the 20th century, who wrote extensively about the Eleusinian Mysteries, concludes that generally they did not require or constitute the adherence to a religion. More concretely, he gives the following description of initiation in regard ancient mysteries:
“Initiations are a well-known phenomenon often discussed by anthropologists.
They are found in a wide range of settings, from the most primitive Australian tribes to American universities. There are many different forms of initiations, including puberty rites, consecration of priests or kings, and admission to secret societies. From a sociological point of view, initiation in general has been defined as ‘status dramatization’ or ritual change of status.
Seen against this background, ancient mysteries still seem to form a special category: they are not puberty rites on a tribal level; they do not constitute secret societies with strong mutual ties; admission is largely independent of either sex or age; and there is no visible change of outward status for those who undergo these initiations.
From the perspective of the participant, the change of status affects his relation to a god or a goddess; the agnostic, in his view from outside, has to acknowledge not so much a social as a personal change, a new state of mind through experience of the sacred.” [2]
The Eleusinian Mysteries by Paul Sérusier, 1888.
The ineffable nature of the initiation
Burkert further explains, how in one of his fragments, Aristotle tells us that nothing was learned (mathein, in the sense of “learning” mathematics for example) during the initiation of Eleusian Mysteries, but that something was suffered there (pathein, in the sense of “undergoing”) and the participants were brought into a certain state of mind.
In this process the Mystes became an initiated person, an Epoptes, someone ‘who had seen’.[3]
In another passage about the character of the initiatory experience Burkert writes: “Two contiguous adjectives, aporrheta ‘forbidden’ and arrheta ‘unspeakable’, appear almost synonymous in this context.”[4]
This can be taken as an indication of the strangely ambivalent status of the mysteries:
It seems that revealing the mystery is strictly forbidden and yet at the same time it is seemingly impossible; this may mean, that if the secret ever got out to the public, it would lose its effect.
Thus, the profanation of the secret, which did occur as we know, did not actually harm the institution; however, the efforts to maintain secrecy seemed to benefit the prestige of the sacred initiation. We will discuss the case of the most famous violation of the mystery in a moment.
Speculation About a Theatrical Performance
Naturally, there was and still is much speculation about what happened in the Telesterion (the temple in Eleusis) during the last night of the mysteries. Some scholars assume that a theatrical performance constituted the essence of it.
Similar to most people of the past, the Greeks of antiquity are often accused of a certain naivety and gullibility. If they believed in the bearded, lightning-throwing man on Mount Olympus, they may have believed to have undergone death and rebirth and seen Persephone in flesh and blood after witnessing a spectacular theatrical performance.
This view appears itself naïve and is essentially based on the modern arrogance of dismissing everything that seems irrational to us today or trivializing everything related to religious ceremonies.
The classical scholar Walter Otto wrote already in 1932: “We must therefore take care not to belittle these mysteries, as many tend to do, by reducing them to the level of agricultural rituals.”[5]
Furthermore, he goes on to reject the idea that the numerous reports we have of the events inside Telesterion during the ceremony convey the actual secret.
He then writes that “it is to the vision that all the beatitudes refer”.[5] While he doesn’t even consider psychoactive substances, which were neither well-known nor widespread at his time, he disregards the possibility of a play due to the reports of the participants.
Carl Ruck, another classicist, aptly notes in The Road to Eleusis that most of the participants, such as Sophocles, Euripides, and the rest of the Athenians, knew elaborate tragedy performances as part of their daily life and it is unlikely that they were particularly impressed or easily fooled by it.
He also goes on to point out that the architecture of the Telesterion was not designed for performances, as the view to the central stage would be limited from many seats inside. [7]
While some theatrical performance was likely taking place, it does not appear to be itself responsible the profound impact on the initiates; neither does it account for the ineffability and uniqueness of the experience, the visions, or the often reported journeys to the underworld.
This is especially true, since the quality of the initiation, its uniqueness and profundity, was reliably guaranteed for up to 3000 participants every year for almost 2000 years.
The well-documented fact that a ritual drink, the Kykeon, was consumed on the last night before the culmination of the ceremony offers a different and quite straightforward possibility.
Sokrates visits his student Alcibiades at Aspasia. Painting by Jean-Léon Gérôme, 19th century.
The Profanation of the Mysteries
Let’s look at one famous case of a profanation of the mysteries.
In the 5th century BC when Alcibiades, a military leader and well-known student of Socrates, as well as some other Athenians, hosted a smaller version of the Mysteries at home whereby a great scandal ensued.
After this instance Alcibiades was banished and his property confiscated, but the death penalty was waived due to his status and reputation. [8]
Although it is unknown what this unveiling of the Mysteries specifically looked like, the nature of the event already allows some conclusions to be drawn:
The main point seems to have been that there was an element of the Mysteries that could be easily and reliably reproduced and that was independent of the location of the actual Mysteries, i.e. did not require priests, the temple, the fasting or the ceremony to be effective.
The significance of this seems clear when you look at our time, as today this would simply be referred to as “recreational substance use”, as opposed to the sacramental or religious use in ceremonies.
There are many cultures, especially in Latin America and Africa that have a continuous tradition of such rites in which they consume Psilocybin Mushrooms, Peyote, or Ayahuasca in ritual contexts.
At least today, the profanation of practices like these is something that has been occurring countless times after people had taken these sacred substances out of their original context to be used in different and often recreational ways.
Something similar seems to have happened at Eleusis as there were other instances of a profanation as well.[9] Yet, the secret never “got out”.
The second part of this article will further explore how this supports the hypothesis that the Kykeon, the ceremonial drink, had a psychedelic punch to it.
Among other things, the difference between propositional knowledge and knowledge by acquaintance John Vervaeke has argued for will be examined, as well as the ineffable nature of altered states and psychedelic journeys.
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[1] Walter Otto, The Meaning of the Eleusinian Mysteries, p. 21, 1932.
[2] Walter Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults, p. 8, 1987.
[3] Walter Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults, p. 69, 1987.
[4] Walter Burkert, Ancient Mystery Cults, p. 9, 1987.
[5] Walter Otto, The Meaning of the Eleusinian Mysteries, p. 21, 1932.
[6] Walter Otto, The Meaning of the Eleusinian Mysteries, p. 28, 1932.
[7] c.f. Hoffman, Wasson, Ruck: The Road to Eleusis, p. 47, 2008 (first edition 1978).
[8] c.f. Carl P. Ruck, Poets, Philosophers, Priests: Entheogens in the Formation of the Classical Tradition, In: Persephones Quest: Entheogens and the Origins of Religion, p. 154, 1986.
[9] Fascinatingly enough, Alcibiades Son is accused of the same crime as his father (c.f. Aelian, Varia Historia (2.41)). Furthermore, Diagoras of Melos (c.f. Aristophanes, Clouds), a poet and philosopher of the 5th century BC, and Andocides (415 B.C., c.f. Andocides, On the Mysteries (his defense speech in court)) were reported to have profaned the mysteries as well.
